Printable organic photovoltaic solar cells (OPV), i.e. polymer solar cells, have now reached impressive power conversion efficiencies at lab scale up to 19%. It is one crucial milestone towards the deployment of OPV products in real life. OPV holds many promisses including potential low cost, large scale, low temperature processing, low energy payback time, low carbon footprint for the production of photovoltaic modules exempt of critical raw materials. However, today, not all are yet scientifically achieved. For example, commercially available OPV modules suffer from low PCE, from 3 to 5 % (30-50 Wp/m2) and are made with still costly raw materials mostly processed from organic solvents. It is a matter of time for the industrial players to catch up with recent academic research to push industrial OPV performances further. This presentation will focuss on three of our recent results: (1) a doping strategy to enable a homojunction hole exctration layer for improved efficiency and stability of OPV, (2) the processing of OPV active layer from water based inks as the ultimate non-toxic, responsible printing with record efficiencies thanks to nanoparticules control and surface energy matching, (3) the investigation on the impact of synthesis impurities, such as metal catalyst residues, on the performances of OPV to design a strategy for cost-effective purification of raw materials. The presentation will close on some real life outdoor OPV energy yield considerations. Will be presented the results on recent products from Héole for marine decarbonation, such as the first OPV sail designed full-sized (92 m2) on a 52” catamaran, released in spring 2022, under testing since then
Printable organic photovoltaic solar cells (OPV), i.e. polymer solar cells, have now reached impressive power conversion efficiencies at lab scale up to 19%. It is one crucial milestone towards the deployment of OPV products in real life. OPV holds many promisses including potential low cost, large scale, low temperature processing, low energy payback time, low carbon footprint for the production of photovoltaic modules exempt of critical raw materials. However, today, not all are yet scientifically achieved. For example, commercially available OPV modules suffer from low PCE, from 3 to 5 % (30-50 Wp/m2) and are made with still costly raw materials mostly processed from organic solvents. It is a matter of time for the industrial players to catch up with recent academic research to push industrial OPV performances further. This presentation will focuss on three of our recent results: (1) a doping strategy to enable a homojunction hole exctration layer for improved efficiency and stability of OPV, (2) the processing of OPV active layer from water based inks as the ultimate non-toxic, responsible printing with record efficiencies thanks to nanoparticules control and surface energy matching, (3) the investigation on the impact of synthesis impurities, such as metal catalyst residues, on the performances of OPV to design a strategy for cost-effective purification of raw materials. The presentation will close on some real life outdoor OPV energy yield considerations. Will be presented the results on recent products from Héole for marine decarbonation, such as the first OPV sail designed full-sized (92 m2) on a 52” catamaran, released in spring 2022, under testing since then.